Shanti’s Dispatches

So the idea of printing to a local FedEx Kinko’s through my PC, via the Internet, sounds a bit far-fetched.

But I’ve done it twice now and I can tell you… it certainly beats going in to Kinko’s, printing something out on nice laser copy, then explaining to them how many copies you’d like, etc.

The first item I printed didn’t come out as expected, but this next one is a fairly straightforward flyer and I can’t see them botching this.

This page on the FedEx site explains a little about the program.

Basically, you install the FedEx Kinko’s program as a printer (kind of like Adobe Acrobat’s PDF Writer). Then, you can print to your local Kinko’s from any program. Just select the FedEx Kinko “Printer” instead of your local one.

And… Ta-da… 3 hours later you can pick up your copies at the local kinko’s.

Random: Disney’s New Pirate Planks Fish Sticks

Mark Cuban: What Am I Missing, Macrovision?

I think the reasoning from the record co’s, etc. standpoint is NOT necessarily to prevent piracy 100%. A 20%, 10%, even 5% reduction in blatant, serial piracy (i.e. not what you’d call fair use) may be just fine for them, and worth it to implement. Obviously the savvy-types will circumvent any method, given enough time (opportunity cost: people are working for McDonald’s Hamburger rates just to pirate a few tunes or dvds).

Mark Cuban: Success and Motivation - You only have to be right once

Always a good read –
Seth Goldstein’s latest: Media Futures, Part 5/5: Arbitrage: IV. New Markets Continued

Deep Throat on how to circumvent FBI-tailing measures

Jane Goodall interview [via Boing Boing]

Back in school, in a philosophy class (don’t ask), we were discussing Artificial Intelligence.

Obviously, the class (teacher included) had watched one too many sci-fi movies. (We’re talking wustl.edu, so you’d expect a little more.)

They were absolutely dumbfounded when I suggested that we have a greater moral imperative to offer Chimps and closely-related primates (DNA-wise) more rights, greater freedoms and living conditions, than we’d ever have to do the same for Artificial Intelligence powered machines.

Yahoo acquires Blo.gs.

Every once in a while, I have time to go through my feeds and catch up on what I’ve been missing in the blogosphere.

Here’s the first installation of the Massive Bloglinks Roundup:
Surreal Furniture by Straightline designs [via Boing Boing]:

Tristan Lewis on Link Counts in the Blogosphere (Yahoo, Google, Technorati, etc.) [via Zawodny]

Ken Norton: How to Hire a Project Manager

Jeremy Zawodny on Really Bad Lock-In points to Jason Calacinis not being able to export his GMail contacts.

This all very much reminds me of Joel Spolsky’s Strategy Letter II: Chicken and Egg Problems.

Google has friendly take-down notices, notices Zawodny.

Ed Adkins on Phoenix, AZ: When People in Hell Die They Go To Phoenix

Awwww, come on, Ed, it’s not that bad! I guess you just get used to it out here. Of course, the winters are beautiful =)

Ed Adkins on ‘Penetration Strategies’ at Accounting Conferences

Google to launch a PayPal alternative?

Creating Passionate Users is one of my favorite new blogs (it may not be new but I just stumbled across it recently)

Funny UFO Prophet hoaxer hits the Boing Boing crowd.

Passionate User blogger Kathy Sierra always puts out some great stuff, such as Building a successful online community and Featuritis vs. the Happy User PeakPolitical Witch hunts and how to get the Enrons, Gary Winnicks, and Bernie Ebbers of the world to pony up their looted $$$ cash money.

The easiest way to talk to a VC? Write about him (or her)

I’ve made the mistake in the past of “cold-emailing” potential connections like VCs or high-profile bloggers. It’s almost pointless unless you have followed their work for a while, commented on their blog, linked to their blogs, etc., etc. so that maybe, just maybe they’ve come across your name before and have an inkling of recognition.

Forget Me Not Panties wins the Contagious Media Showdown

Mark sez Sky Dayton gets $400M for next 3G wirless venture. Holy dot-com bubble, batman, are we back there!

If you liked All Marketers Are Liars by Seth Godin, you might enjoy these.

After adding a new connection today (an old high-school buddy of mine), I discovered that I now have an NFL player in my extended LinkedIn network.

Not sure if that’s useful in anyway… but it’s just plain cool.

Daniel O’Connor, a talented young programmer from the land down under (Australia, mate!), has just released a beta version of
Alcoholix, a new web app in the vein of Upcoming.org, 43 Things, etc. that allows you to find bars and network with friends…

Brilliant, simply brilliant.

Mini-Microsoft: Bob Herbold, The “Fiefdom Syndrome,” and Bob’s Message to Microsoft

Just check the comments.

Microsoft should promote this guy. Heck, make him a VP while their at it.

I’d like to thank our sponsors (for the next few months) here at sablog.com.

Here’s a friendly message from our sponsors:

When the economy feels like a game of roulette, when politics are reduced to how to win at slots, and when finance blogs are simply online casino ads, then succumb to the forces of baccarat and production and start playing keno for cash!

… and now back to our regularly scheduled blogging!

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Steve Jobs sez to Stanford grads, ‘You’ve got to find what you love’:

I dropped out of Reed College after the first 6 months, but then stayed around as a drop-in for another 18 months or so before I really quit. So why did I drop out?

It started before I was born. My biological mother was a young, unwed college graduate student, and she decided to put me up for adoption. She felt very strongly that I should be adopted by college graduates, so everything was all set for me to be adopted at birth by a lawyer and his wife.

…

And 17 years later I did go to college. But I naively chose a college that was almost as expensive as Stanford, and all of my working-class parents’ savings were being spent on my college tuition. After six months, I couldn’t see the value in it. I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life and no idea how college was going to help me figure it out. And here I was spending all of the money my parents had saved their entire life. So I decided to drop out and trust that it would all work out OK. It was pretty scary at the time, but looking back it was one of the best decisions I ever made. The minute I dropped out I could stop taking the required classes that didn’t interest me, and begin dropping in on the ones that looked interesting.

It wasn’t all romantic. I didn’t have a dorm room, so I slept on the floor in friends’ rooms, I returned coke bottles for the 5¢ deposits to buy food with, and I would walk the 7 miles across town every Sunday night to get one good meal a week at the Hare Krishna temple. I loved it. And much of what I stumbled into by following my curiosity and intuition turned out to be priceless later on. Let me give you one example:

…

Again, you can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something - your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.

Read the rest here.

Andreas of BlogsNow points me to the BlogsNow Version 2 Preview.

The top story right now on there is about an abortionist accused of eating fetuses.

BlogsNow and del.icio.us/popular are my two favorite “have to check” every day or so sites.

If you check those two sites, you’re pretty much set when it comes to checking up on the latest news / articles / links that everyone seems to be reading.

Oh yeah, Andreas also says that blo.gs just got bought by Yahoo.

What’s next, Microsoft to acquire Technorati?

Nice Kuro5hin article on who Google might buy next:

Google is the new Internet behemoth, snatching up small companies left and right. So, in this article, I ask: what tech gems are in the running for Google’s growing subsidiary menagerie? To help predict, I will first take a look at who Google has acquired in the past and what Google has done for them, and then I’ll throw out a few possibilities for Googlification and discuss where they might fit into Google’s strategy.

(via Slashdot… so uhhh, you’ve probably already seen the article! heh)